Senior representatives from Smart Cities including Ludhiana, Ajmer, Jaipur, Gurgaon and Bhubaneswar participated in the meeting.

FSSAI CEO Pawan Agarwal said that food has been largely ignored in city planning, despite it being the central piece around which life revolves.

"There is now a golden opportunity to integrate food systems management into the smart city guidelines," he said in a statement.

The Food Smart Cities would have end-to-end solutions for food systems in urban areas.

Stating that rapid urbanisation has raised concerns about food quality, FSSAI said: "One of the ways to address this is to integrate sustainable food safety and nutrition systems within the smart city design and create Food Smart Cities".

FSSAI has proposed a four-pillar approach that cities could undertake at the local level to ensure safety and hygiene across the supply chain.

"The workshop concluded with a decision that a framework for food smart cities would be further refined and circulated to cities around the country, aspiring to be Food Smart Cities," FSSAI said.